


Consequences

by Dreadful Weather Today (TearoomSaloon)



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Healing, Hospitals, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-13
Updated: 2014-04-13
Packaged: 2018-01-19 07:14:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,054
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1460527
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TearoomSaloon/pseuds/Dreadful%20Weather%20Today
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He made a mistake. He'd been an idiot, he made a mistake, and now she was unconscious in a white bed. The nurses were touchy about him being too close. She was fresh out of surgery, and after what had happened, she wasn't going to be in a superb emotional state when she finally woke up.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Consequences

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: Alana gets hurt because of Hannibal. He has to nurse her back to health.

            He'd been an idiot.

            He'd been an idiot and was now suffering the consequences, watching the heart monitor keep at a steady pace, so on edge that his head whipped around whenever it spiked or slowed. He'd been an idiot and he didn't like this hand of cards.

            She looked so feeble; face pale, hair lank, tubes hooked up to her arms, her back, her hands. The nurses roused her every hour to check vitals and adjust dosages, but she never came out of a semi-conscious state. She'd lost a lot of blood, they told him. She was lucky to be breathing.

            He had been careless, accidentally pointing one of the Vergers at her. He had come in like a lion, of course, teeth bared and eyes wild, but...things hadn't turned out too well. For one, the stitches in his shoulder still stung and two, there was Alana, broken, injured, and weak. Poor, sweet little lamb.

            She slept for days. She had been split open brutally. The surgery had gone well but the injury was clearly still high concern, for the nurses redressed the wound frequently and checked for any signs of infection or fever. He didn’t want to be there when she woke up, when they told her. He needed to, but he didn’t want to see her face, couldn’t handle seeing her face.

            “Hey.”

            Hannibal stumbled awake from a light doze, back aching and neck kinked from sleeping in a chair for a week. He could have gone home, but he needed to be there for this moment. “Hello, Alana, dear.”

            She smiled faintly, beckoning him forward with a finger.

            He took her hand and kissed her forehead. “I’m glad you’re in one piece.”

            “Me too, though I’m not sure what’s happened. Aside from the obvious, I mean. I take it I’m going to be okay?”

            The grin dropped from his face.

            “Hannibal, what’s wrong?”

            “I’m glad I’m going to be the one, I guess.” He sighed, stroking one of her cheeks. “You were sliced open below the navel. There was an emergency surgery; you lost a lot of blood. Your uterus was damaged beyond repair—”

            “I can’t have kids.”

            He couldn’t look her in the eye. “No.”

            She nodded slowly, staring blankly before her. “We won’t have kids.”

            _That_ stung.

            Realizing how strongly she felt warmed him like whisky. Realizing the full consequences of his mistake smashed him in the face with a train.

            “You wanted to bear my children?” It was a near-whisper. “Even with all you know about me?”

            “I’ve seen under the mask. I didn’t run.” Her voice was thick now, heavy with the situational gravity.

            He tucked her into his arms and she cried.

            The nurses didn’t mention more than they needed to. Her body language was visibly despondent and they could tell with one look from him that she knew. He told her and she knew. He shouldered their grave task of telling a woman her body could no longer serve its reproductive purpose.

            She wouldn’t eat.

            He brought her home and made her food but she wouldn’t eat. She picked around her plate, tossing scraps to the fluffy mutt that weaved around the chair legs, but she wouldn’t eat. She stared into the dish, sipping slowly at her water, avoiding putting anything in her mouth.

            “You need nutrition to recover, Alana.”

            “I went to medical school too,” she said quietly, “I know what I need. The surgery took my appetite.”

            “Appetite or not, you are slowing the healing process.”

            “What’s the point?”

            He laid his silverware on his plate. “Pardon?”

            “I can’t have children. I can’t have children, I’m probably going to go through an early menopause, I’m in so much pain right now, I’m weak, I’m tired, my hormones are _haywire_ ,” she rubbed her eyes with the bottom of her palms, “and now, _now_ I’m crying again. I can’t stop _crying_.”

            He crossed around the table and kneeled beside her.

            Alana rolled her eyes. “And now you’re getting sappy.”

            “I am not getting sappy.”

            “You’re on your knees trying to comfort a woman who’s depressed because her body can’t figure out how to use emotions correctly without a body part.” She smiled weakly. “I appreciate you trying, but this is just out of character.”

            “You peg me too callously, Alana.”

            “You eat people, Hannibal.”

            He rose and kissed her forehead. “Touché.”

            He stayed with her for a week after being discharged. She couldn’t walk up stairs so he carried her, always careful of her stitches. After the second night, she wouldn’t let him sleep on the couch, demanding he stay by her constantly.

            “What if I roll over and hurt you?” he asked, standing hesitantly at the foot of her bed.

            “We’ve never had that issue before, why would it spring up now?”

            “Your injury will make you less prone to moving in your sleep.”

            “Get under the covers.”

            He sighed, reluctantly following orders. In truth, he didn’t want to sleep next to her because he wouldn’t sleep. He would stay up and watch her breathe, his conscience (it was small and usually silent, but still there), banging it into him that this was _his_ fault. He hurt her. He caused this. _He_ was the reason he’d never have children, even if he decided he wanted them. They would never be his because they’d never be hers too, and she was now a part of him.

            She didn’t care about the mask.

            She saw past the painted cover of himself and into the smudged charcoal of his being. She knew what he was but still wanted to coat her fingers in the chalky black dust.

            “Now, if I need you, you’re right here.”

            “I can be right here in the chair by the bed as well.”

            Alana reached over and weaved her fingers in his hair. “Here is closer than the chair.”

            With a small smile, he rolled nearer and kissed her cheek. “You’re going to be okay, understand?”

            “I understand.”

            “This changes nothing between us.”

            She nodded, eyes wet.

            “And I…” He looked away, embarrassed by the coming words. Embarrassed how human they made him feel, how vulnerable. “I love you.”

            She laughed for the first time in weeks. “I love you too. But you’re still a monster.”

            “More than you know.”


End file.
